


Worth the Seams

by YawningOverTheTapestries



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: AU, But not what you might expect, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, John patches Sherlock up after a case, LITERALLY, Love Confessions, M/M, Magical Realism, Sherlock's Hair, doll!lock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-26
Updated: 2014-06-26
Packaged: 2018-02-06 09:00:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1852225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YawningOverTheTapestries/pseuds/YawningOverTheTapestries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>" Sherlock's squirm is enough to tell John to pull his hand away; instead he lets it drift back to the sheaf of paper covered in Sherlock's untidy scrawl.</p><p>Black and sable and reddish chestnut are hanging all round the kitchen like sausages in a butcher's. John looks warily at them; this reminds him of being in his surgery trying to discuss something chronic with a patient.</p><p>'Are you absolutely sure about this?' "</p>
            </blockquote>





	Worth the Seams

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Dollkind](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1696286) by [orphan_account](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account). 



> As much of a lover of stuffed dolls, and kleptomaniac magpie of colours and fabrics and oddments from flea markets, as I am, please don't let me take all the credit for this.

"I hope you've counted these properly, Sherlock. I don't know if I'm going to trust all these algorithms of yours, or just leave it to you and sew where you tell me."

"Just close up my back before you start fussing with anything else." Laid out over the table, Sherlock replies in an unimpressed monotone into the flat surface, the odd scratch prickling against his face. The long smooth slope of burnished-cotton back bared at John, pale in the glassy neon light above the table, the seam of his spine ripped between his shoulders, and the ragged edges extending up his neck and across the back of his head. Tangled threads and a thin ridge of stuffing spiked up through the tear, making him look nothing less startling than a rag doll needing to be fixed, but the deeply courteous doctor feels this was handling an injured patient, simply made of fabric rather than flesh. Nonetheless Sherlock feels light, almost insubstantial, and wanting to feel more heavy solidity as he lets one arm dangle onto the nearest chair. His shirt draped over the back of it, a handful of chunky black things sat well within Sherlock's reach, and he absentmindedly lets his fingers bury amongst them.

 

John is very gentle, as always, stroking his thumb up the line of Sherlock's back and pushing the snowy fluff back inside, and holding the open edges closed to see how they'd look stitched back into place. The ripped thread that used to fasten up this half of his back is certainly best off trimmed and pulled out, and doing this showed just how the opening could be neatly closed, following the track of the stitching, where it lay before being torn up.

"Not going to have a lifelong grudge against chicken wire, are you?" John chides him gently.

"Why would I?"

If John's lucky enough to not be subjected to too lethal a quip from Sherlock, later on when he's in one piece again, it might turn almost into a joke. "Well, for once you left your precious coat in my charge, during the rare occasion of a load of kidnap victims being found in the most dilapidated corner of an old animal rescue centre. And I could be mean and say if I didn't let you dive under and get your back ripped open - "

"You've had practice, John. Don't give me any reason to think you have cause to hesitate."

 

 

He couldn't be more right. Sherlock had been given his Heart only a couple of weeks ago, but John had lost far too much sleep from it.

It's pretty much a rite of passage amongst the Dollkind community and their Menders, the closest thing to any traditional _human_ show of an affirmed relationship, or romance or sentiment of any kind, without seeming inappropriate. And it certainly is _not_ a gesture of ownership. Dolls are hardly human, but it's quite a struggle to find adequate describing words otherwise. And trust John to beg to differ.

It wouldn't be right at all to describe Sherlock as 'programmed'. It would imply what people used to think about Dollkind, that they're properties of complete artifice that belong to their Menders. A horribly condescending thing to say, ignoring virtually all the progress Dollkind have made into the world, and that had happened a long time before John's and Sherlock's paths crossed ( _it's all fine_ ). And the fact that Sherlock's made almost completely from things normally found in dusty box-rooms, and stocked like battery chickens into the bay windows of little shops in exotic corners of town, makes pretty much no difference to the fact of how remarkable he is. On top of that, the giving of a Heart has been turned from a very personal emotional matter between Doll and Mender, into something rather more commercial.

Now, every good haberdashery has a little shelf of stuffed Hearts in fruity shades of scarlet and cherry, studded with fanciful Valentine-worthy decorations, ornate beads and buttons and other sparkly embellishments. The world knows what romance is supposed to look like, and seems to contradict the belief of a Doll's individuality: a Doll is of course made to mass-produced patterns, but once a Mender adopts them, a Doll gets personalised with patches and embroidery, eventually making the Doll as unique as anyone else.

The problem is, a Mender can be as skilled as a surgeon, and still have a bland imagination. That's probably why there are little shelves full of Hearts all ready-made for giving to a Doll. Which is fine if you really can't make one yourself.

 

 

John tries to put it out of his mind, fishing through the basket to find the spool of flesh-coloured thread, buried under other bits and pieces and spare bags of Provence lavender. The Heart he lost so much sleep over, staying up late shut in the privacy of his room upstairs to finish it, and worry about it, is now sat deep in the tight stuffing of Sherlock's sleek chest. Where John can't get at it, and he doesn't want to. Too late now.

Despite this uncomfortable feeling, John can't help be a little pleased with his handiwork. Sherlock's Heart is a dark colour, and might have been hard to hide in the swathe of white. John certainly can feel it - it feels warm, like, ironically enough, the battery of an electronic gadget being charged. Half of it is a warm rosy colour - John's a romantic - but the other half is a shade of violet that caught John's eye very quickly. A startlingly familiar shade of deep purple, John sees in a pile on the floor of either one of their bedrooms, as much as anywhere else. It felt slightly embarrassing in the shop, but he managed to hold it together to get out of the shop with two fat quarters. He'd told himself to do this himself, despite the risk of Sherlock discovering it half-finished and confronting John with it. Luckily, John just about kept it under wraps, stitching four initials on one side and three on the other, along with the spare button from one of his cardigans - he's not the kind of person who loses buttons - and a tag pulled off a part of his old military uniform, amongst a few other things. Hardly the sort of thing anyone would sell in a shop, but certainly as special as it really ought to be.

It was already enough of a surprise when John brought the subject up, but when he tucked the Heart into Sherlock's hands, for his approval before stitching it into the appropriate place, Sherlock was quite lost for words.

And even more so now, when the solving of a case went almost wrong in just the right way, to bring it up again.

 

 

John frowns a little, as he starts stitching the end of the opening in Sherlock's back. He doesn't know what to say, as the silence from Sherlock is pretty ominous.

Not out of maliciousness, but because this is strange and new, and so difficult to describe. The best way is 'a substitute for an ordinary gesture of affection', which sounds a little insulting. But, cruel as it sounds, it's very true. They've yet to say anything about how they feel about one another.

Sherlock's feels almost vulnerable, like this, having his back sewn up, quite innocently keeping maintenance up. Because last time he was lying on his front like this, John was stitching his back closed after tucking his Heart into it's rightful place. And Sherlock's manners have always needed refining, but there's really no excuse for not breathing a word afterwards.

 

 

"You proverbially wear your heart on your sleeve, don't you, John?" Sherlock asks in a low voice.

John considers this. "Well..." He finishes and casts off once the seam joins the line running over his shoulders, crossing perpendicular the line that runs up the back of his neck. "That's one way of putting it."

"My hair's in a pitiful state, isn't it? Is it really going to have to go?" Sherlock's soft whine sounds almost mournful. John knows Sherlock can only feel the tear in his scalp, which is bad enough. His hair, like practically all Dollkind, was made and laid on in layers in a similar fabric to the rest of his body, and traditionally, once they come of age, and get adopted, they can start having alterations like this. Which are expensive, and very much a luxury. A sign of a seriously good Mender and an even better bond to their Doll. Hence, difficult to get right; punching hair into the scalp might hurt, or at least be more uncomfortable than sewing seams. There are other methods, but they have their own flaws as well. And the Holmes family can be as fond of tradition as they like, but Sherlock's chequered past never went unnoticed.

"Sherlock, listen... " John runs his fingers down Sherlock's back. "Someone's got to keep you looked after, because you can do your best to pull the wool over everyone's eyes, but they're not around you 24/7. It's a ridiculous job but someone's got to do it."

Sherlock lets his head tilt to one side. "Rather prosaic of you to say so, John."

"Yes, but... Sherlock, I do love how ridiculous you are. I don't think I'd want to have you any other way."

Still with his face against the table, Sherlock grins awkwardly. "At this exact moment certainly, I think you have that methodized well."

John chuckles lightly. "Yes, of course. I'll finish stitching you up, okay? Please do scream if I hurt you."

 

Sherlock scrunches up a little, and tilts his head down and forward to give John as best access as possible to the ripped seam running up his neck and head. Which unfortunately is too much of an unruly mess of rugged edges, brown and white mussed into each other, to leave in one piece, and try to fix without taking it apart. Sherlock's right-side parting runs right across his head, and John slowly unpicks each stitch and peels the layers of dark brown back, carefully pulling the frayed edges apart.

The stitches are now a pair of faint flecked trails running parallel alongside the seam joining the two halves of his head. It makes Sherlock look even more like something limp and artificial, with a head bare and pockmarked. Each stitch pulled up makes Sherlock flinch very slightly, not that it hurt, but it just feels so alien, so unlike anything Sherlock's ever experienced. His smile has twisted out of shape.

John's light touch, sealing Sherlock's head closed once more, feels even weirder. Almost a tickle, yet far from anything pleasant. Like the strain on your scalp of having hair tied back a little too tight. Sherlock's squirm is enough to tell John to pull his hand away; instead he lets it drift back to the sheaf of paper covered in Sherlock's untidy scrawl.

"You really did see this coming, didn't you?"

"Obviously," Sherlock replies almost in scorn.

Black and sable and reddish chestnut are hanging all round the kitchen like sausages in a butcher's. John looks warily at them; this reminds him of being in his surgery trying to discuss something chronic with a patient.

This is how Dollkind work, and this is how they scar. John wonders how much it really does hurt. _Surely_ it's not as much as a bullet.

"Are you absolutely sure about this?"

 

Sherlock swings himself gracefully upright, to sit atop the table and glower for a moment, his stripped head looking dull and stark under the light. He slumps into the other chair in a manner that looks not petulant, for once, but shameful. "I'm sure."

John hates having to remind himself to watch his bedside manner. "Okay," he answers amenably.

Sherlock dips his head, the carve mark that had been gaping open just minutes before, now trickling innocuously along the slope of his cranium and down his neck.

 

 

The pattern, which Sherlock has drawn by himself, outlines how it works, how widely spaced each layer is, and the ratio of space between each piece. He'd obviously worked hard at this to keep the density even all over, and how they all align to look natural. Almost all of it is black, but it fades to a richer maple colour along the top part of his head, which is obviously the part that everyone's going to see properly first. And, oh, yes, satin. It has to be satin embroidery thread. John ended up blowing the best part of a long morning shift's pay on it all, but, sod it: if it's worth doing, it's worth doing to the best it can be. And it's good that at least one of them knows what he's doing.

Just as well; John bites his lip as he skim reads it one last time. The black bundles look like paintbrushes, long and thick and tied at the end, with a brush-tip. At the other end is a loop, which is perfect to work with.

"Let me try something, first... " John carefully tilts Sherlock's head back and sideways, to mark out lines with tailor's chalk, and try to visualize how everything would fit on. John doesn't want to punch in these locks, giving Sherlock's pain threshold the benefit of the doubt. The first lock gets bolted on with several oversewn stitches, tight enough to latch it firmly to Sherlock's head, not budging even when John pulls at it, just hard enough to test it - and keeping his mouth shut, awaiting an inevitable splurge of drama-queen-esque fuss.

 

But Sherlock holds his tongue, thinking himself something of a klutz, but really, it can only get better from here on in. John's feeling more at ease as well. He's probably going to have raw fingers by the end of the night, but the end result will probably be pretty good. He's a doctor, after all, and has been long before he started being a Mender. If Sherlock does ever repeat his little incident with the chicken wire, or something to that effect, at least the idiot will hopefully be easier to patch up again.

The process takes ages, longer than either of them have anticipated. For long, snail's-pace-slow hours, the bundles of thread, chunky like thick yarn and, at Sherlock's insistence, to be laid on in a very specific order, get bolted on, from the nape of his neck upwards. Like the Norwood-Hamilton scale being reversed. If Sherlock starts fussing again, out of boredom than really out of anything else, John simply keeps his firm expression up and pins Sherlock to the chair by his shoulders or wrists. Just a wordless command of stillness. John's keeping his patience as much as he can; his hands will deserve some rest by the end of the night.

 

 

Slowly Sherlock starts to wane as well, head starting to loll sleepily, which means John has to keep his head held in a more upright position, as the russet and darker brown bundles start going on, in another section at the front, to extend backwards and meet the black section behind it. The parting on the right is still there. Sherlock has always had it, and it's still as distinctive as all the other sharp features embroidered into his face.

"Finished yet?" Sherlock sighs - as each individual lock is stitched onto his scalp, the needle had mapped right across his scalp, sending an almost-unpleasant tingle spreading slowly like melting wax. He can feel the window of bare fabric close bit by bit, and now the centre is being filled in and closed up, as neatly as possible as there's no spare space left.

"Sherlock, my fingers are raw, and I need a sit down." John breathes against Sherlock's ear. It's got dark around them, and although the lion's share of the work is done, John really does deserve a break before completing the very last phase.

 

The room looks considerably emptier, but the litter of paper and thread ends and steelware still covers the table. Tidying up doesn't sound the slightest bit fun, but they've - _Sherlock's_ \- left almost the entire floor in a worse state and Mrs Hudson has yet to have a nervous breakdown, so John leaves it to go and collapse onto the sofa. Sherlock follows, sliding neatly over his contours, head against John's chest, pulling one arm round his waist.

John slides his other hand through the mass of braided satin, feeling them all lying heavily over each other and bunching against Sherlock's head. "You look Rastafarian," he comments.

Sherlock makes a neutral sound, muffled against fuzzy cable knit. John feels wonderfully heavy and solid and warm, and Sherlock feels himself go pliant, being hugged close against this wonderful thing called a heartbeat. Even though Sherlock is stuffed pretty tightly, he's still soft all the way through. John eases his head down a little, before starting to unfasten the first braid. The satin feels tough at first - trust Sherlock to tie everything up with enough security to put MI5 to shame (sometimes making Mycroft's temper flare with a single word is just plain _dull_ ). But John slowly works the satin in his fingers, coaxing it out gently, instead of being assertive and strong-wristed with a needle.

Fluffy curls begin to blossom like opening flowers through his fingers, and the satin almost has a shimmer to it, in the warm light pouring from the kitchen. John can't help but brush through it over and over, and it feels quite soothing. And with a lap full of Sherlock heaped into a puddle of affection, there's no chance of getting back up. He finally lifts his head when John at last reaches the top. The orange glow from outside touches the reddish highlights, and the final piece of his fringe comes undone and pings out of John's hands. That smile, half-awake, adoring, unguarded, warm and open, is utterly heart-melting, lighting up all John's handsome face.

"There, now. You look yourself again." And Sherlock certainly does look his best all over again, one lock twisting across his forehead like a treble clef. Sherlock's smooth cheeks deepen in colour very slightly, his crystal-pale eyes shining; he stuffs his head back into John's chest and has to thank him from there.

 

 

Or, at least, that's what he thought he'd said. What he'd wanted to say, and couldn't ever quite find the right way to prise the words up, until now.

And upon a sudden John sinks his hands and face into Sherlock's head of hair again, kisses being pressed behind his ear and up across his forehead. "Oh, Sherlock... I didn't know you had it in you. But that's all I want to hear... I love you too, I love you so much. I always have done, you're brilliant and extraordinary and - "

Sherlock cuts him off with a kiss, or just about a kiss. An incredibly light brush of his lips against John's, just enough to stop him crooning, but so gentle and tentative, John can feel all the air escape his lungs. Sherlock's blush reddens even more, in fact all the satin patches over his skin are starting to darken. His plush fabric body feels so warm, the heat at his core radiating out, as much as his hair is soft, and John's fingers against his scalp soothes the prickling into a wonderful caress.

 

Hours later, curled into one another in bed, John has at long last exhausted his longing to stroke that curly mess, for the night at least, and has arms wrapped possessively round Sherlock's chest. Where John's peppered-blonde head is easily within reach to press close. Sherlock's Heart still feels warm, and it will probably remain so all night. And even more with whatever the new day will bring with it.

 


End file.
